Pointing or Honouring?

[Densa44]

I've always wanted to hear what the rules are when it appears that the honouring dog is actually pointing the bird. I'm not sure in what section this should be posted. I'll try to post a picture or two if I can.

In the invitational does it matter if both dogs point the bird, or must the dog who is the farthest away, stop immediately?

I hunt with a number of trained dogs and they all honour, and I haven't taught it to them. I have seen coyotes on many occasions stop while another coyote is standing over a gopher hole.

I'd appreciate any insight that any one has.

[orhunter]

Honoring is when only one dog smells the bird.

[Coveyrise64]

Honoring has nothing to do with pointing the bird. The honoring dog should be sight pointing the dog that has the bird pointed. If both dogs are in the scent cone I wouldn't call that an honor. It's possible to have a shared find but highly unlikely in the test environment because the judges for the most part will try to keep the dogs separated until one or the other does point a bird. How the honoring dog responds to the situation dictates whether the judges want or need to see more and will usually wait for another backing situation.

cr

[Densa44]

That helps, thank you very much. I have a picture of mother and daughter, where the daughter is on point and mom is a long way back and honouring the point, but they both could be in the scent cone. I guess that why we have judges.

thx

[orhunter]

True, they could both be in the scent cone and probably are a lot of the time but the honoring dog isn't using scent to establish its position. A lot depends on the on the position of the dogs relative to each other during the search and discovery. Many times the judges are required to set up the scenario in such a way they can get the results they're after if the dogs didn't do it on their own during the field search portion of the test.

[Fun Dog]

Divided finds happen. Two dogs running, maybe from opposite directions even, and they hit the scent cone at the same time. It’s pretty cool to see. Twice during a run at invitational the dogs were out of sight for mere moments. When we caught up to them they were both stopped. It was up to the judges to decide which was on point. Sometimes it was obvious. Other times not so much. Pointing dog may be more intense. Or backing dog may start panting. If you’re in heavy brush, the pointing dog may not be visible to its brace mate. Even if both dogs are in the scent cone, the dog at the back needs to respect the dog at the front. If he doesn’t respect the dog he may move forward and try to steal the point which is not a good thing.